Sad piece here in today’s Oregonian about Portland trial lawyer Mike Shinn, who faces possible disbarment for taking clients’ money. Seems like this is just a take-it-in-the-shorts week for trial lawyers, as former trial lawyer John Edwards seems to be digging himself an awfully deep hole.

In the Shinn matter, the Oregon State Bar is reportedly pressing ahead with disciplinary proceedings, as it should. The Bar may also ask for an emergency suspension of Shinn’s license to practice.

Simple rule that every Oregon lawyer knows:  If you take a client’s money, you lose your license. It’s got to remain an absolute rule.  Clients need to trust that their lawyers are dealing fairly and honestly with them.

It’s sometimes easy for client-lawyer relations to go bad. You’re never starting in a happy and good place if you need a lawyer.  And that’s when the client first walks in the door.  Some lawyers do a particularly bad job of communicating with clients, and this can add to problems.  But none of those things ever justifies a lawyer taking an undeserved dime from a client. And if that’s what happened, Mr. Shinn should lose his license.

I’ve known Mike Shinn casually for a long time. He’s done some great work over the years. My hope is that this is all a misunderstanding and that he didn’t cross any lines. Regardless of my hope, the Bar needs to get to the bottom of it.  As for the former clients who are pressing their claims, we owe them both apologies and gratitude. It’s a thankless position. If there’s a lawyer out there acting corruptly, the willingness to challenge is the best way to protect the public.

Kudos, too, to Judge Tennyson who had the unenviable job of blowing the whistle. You don’t get a lot of love letters when you turn someone in. But it’s the right thing to do.

I’ve been ruminating all day on this story, along with my continuing annoyance over the Edwards matter. Maybe they’re totally unrelated. During my noon-hour work out, I had a flashback to my teen years. At the height of the Watergate scandal, I was sitting outside under tall shade trees with my apolitical grandfather. Harry was the kind of guy who wanted nothing more than to run his business, sip his whiskey and have a good time. He viewed all politicians with suspicion when he thought about them at all.

I was riveted by the Watergate hearings, and I asked Harry what he thought about the whole thing.

He took a long draw off his scotch, “They were schmucks,” he said.

“What do you mean?” I countered. I think I was thrilled that he would share some wisdom with me, his raging adolescent grandson.

“They were schmucks for doing it, ” he said. And then a quarter beat later he added, ” And they were bigger schmucks for getting caught.”

Maybe Harry’s take fits better on Edwards. As for lawyers who take clients’ money, well they’re schmucks from the get go.

David Sugerman

Fair to assume that a number of employers sat up and took notice of these whopping big EEOC settlements finalized in U.S. District Court here in Oregon. The Oregonian news report suggests that Video Only was ordered by Judge King to pay a total of $630,000 on the two claims and the EEOC’s enforcement action. Not clear whether this was a private settlement, a consent decree or an actual decision.

According to the report, two employees–one Hispanic and the other African American, with a Jewish family–endured repeated racial, ethnic and religious slurs. Store management participated in the repeated misconduct. To add insult to injury, the news article reports that after receiving their complaints, Video Only hired an investigator to attempt to discredit the two men.

Here’s how the EEOC described the situation: “Our investigation discovered harassment that engaged in the worst stereotypes and slurs about blacks, Latinos and Jews, and that upper management actively participated in this behavior,” said Mike Baldonado, the EEOC’s acting district director. “The settlement should send a strong message that harassment based on race, national origin and religion has no place in the workplace.”

The news report also explains that the $500,000 of the $630,000 will be awarded to the two victims, and the balance will be paid to two co-workers who apparently suffered retaliation for supporting the complaints.

The size of the settlement should send a message to Oregon employers that management-led discrimination is going to result in a rather expensive slap down. That’s a good thing.

For my part, I can imagine that the men who took this on had a terribly difficult course at work and then–after blowing the whistle–likely had things get worse before they got better.

I’ve learned from clients over the years that blowing the whistle on employment discrimination is tough, especially when it is wide-spread and when it involves race, religion or sexual harassment. To my way of thinking, these four employees who said no deserve our thanks. By facing the monster, they made the workplace better for the rest of us. The other thing is that they’ve taught their children that sometimes we have to do hard things. Heroic.

David Sugerman

So it should be no surprise that Bill Sizemore, Racketeer gets lots of money, but  according to this, his funding comes from Loren Parks, an out-of-state donor who has pumped $8 million into Oregon initiatives.  The Oregonian article does a fairly decent job of tracking the money, as Mr. Parks finances Bill Sizemore, Racketeer and Kevin Mannix. In the mix, also, is Russ Walker who is connected to the Washington, DC anti-tax, anti-lawyer group, FreedomWorks.

The Oregonian missed background on Mr. Parks. He’s an…uh…interesting–yeah, that’s the ticket–character. While he is not a licensed physician or mental health therapist, Mr. Parks provides services to women including sexual therapy. I haven’t gone into the links here, but it appears that Mr. Parks purports to provide some form of hypnotherapy to women suffering from sexual problems.

Seems like this stuff could only come from Hollywood. Sad to say that it’s not fiction. Sadder still,these are the people who have hijacked Oregon’s cherished initiative system.  I think we should all demand better.

David Sugerman

I hadn’t been following the nutrition information restaurant posting issue too closely. It seems that a divided county commission took the first step to require chain restaurants to post nutrition information yesterday. I was a bit surprised that Lisa Naito voted against, and Maria Rojo de Steffy initially opposed the measure.

Naito’s  opposition surprised me because she had previously led the charge to remove trans fats from the menu of Multnomah County restaurants. As for Rojo de Steffy, she’s been identified as a former board member of the American Heart Association.  Rojo de Steffy eventually joined the majority, but Naito soldiered on.

The Oregonian didn’t mention the Oregon Restaurant Association, but I assumed that their fingerprints were all over the opposition. This note seems to confirm my suspicion.

The Restaurant Association is often something of a sheep in wolf’s clothing. On a national level, the tobacco industry uses the National Restaurant Association as its surrogate on issues like smoke free bars and restaurant rules. The same is apparently true on a local level.  They also get involved in gambling issues.  The point is that I’m not a fan, and it’s nice to see them lose something that obviously matters to them.

As to the substantive issue, I have to wonder why opponents are so torqued about this one.  We hear a lot about personal responsibility, choice, and free markets from those who advocate less regulation. Cool beans. But see, the only thing that is going on here is that consumers are getting more information so that they can make informed choices. I guess I have to wonder what’s wrong with giving consumers more information.

David Sugerman